A heart takes more than a year to heal
by WordsAreASacredThing
Summary: It was a year ago. A year ago that the fake genius fell to his death from the top of Saint Barts Hospital in London after the news spread like wildfire that everything he had said, everything he had done, was a lie. He took his own life. His best friend was left picking up the pieces of his broken heart and broken soul off the hard cold floor of reality. This is his story.
1. The pain of being left by those you love

It had been a whole year since Sherlock had-

Since Sherlock had killed himself.

God, it still hurt John to say it, to even think it. He'd tried his best to think of reasons his best friend, Sherlock Holmes, would take his own life. So far, he had thought of nothing. Came up with no ideas. It was a dead end. Sherlock would be disappointed in him and his lack of detecting skills. Would have been disappointed. He's not really in a position to be disappointed any more.

After Sherlock died, John hadn't known what to do. Part of him died that day along with the great detective, a big part of him. He'd hoped for a long time that Sherlock had faked it, he had managed to get out of it some how but after six months of waiting... He had given up on that dream.

It was funny, John had been so alone after returning for Afghanistan. So very alone, yet it was now, surrounded by the friends he had made whilst with Sherlock, that he felt more alone than ever.

Molly and Mrs Hudson had enveloped him in love and warmth after Sherlock passed. They regularly checked in on him, though he thought it was more likely that it was to stop him from doing anything stupid than to actually spend time with him. Why would they want to spend time with him?

He was an idiot.

He thought he knew Sherlock.

He thought he understood him.

He thought he could read him.

Nobody could ever have been more wrong.

Why would anyone want to spend time with him?

He let down the one person he should have been there for. He would never be able to forgive himself. It was not possible. He had failed the Detective, failed himself. He was supposed to look after him, that's what friends do. That's what family does.

And now he wouldn't never see his closest friend, his best friend, his brother, again.


	2. The anger that comes calling

He still received fake calls off people, pretending to be Sherlock, pretending that he was okay. It was all a big joke to them. This man, this crazy man had lied and was a huge fraud, he had become famous from his dirty sins. And now he was dead. That's all it was to people. To the public.

No one understood who he really was.

He had perfected the technique of seeming not to care, of being a stone and having no emotions but spending time with him, John had learned the truth about this mysterious man. Inside his hard metallic skin there was a very delicate creature. One that did feel. One that felt every time Donovan called him Freak. One that had felt when John had-

When John had called him a machine. That had been a mistake. A heat of the moment mistake that he could never take back now. It didn't matter anyway. It was just another way he had failed. He didn't need it. The more he thought about it the more sick he felt.

People still recognised him in the street. They recognised him in the damned street and tried to talk about _Sherlock_ to _him. _As if they knew _him_. They had no idea. **No idea at all.** No one did. They all tried so hard to unwind the great Sherlock Holmes, Why had he lied? Was he so desperate for the attention? Maybe it was years of living under his brothers shadow? And no matter how many times John told them, the papers and tabloids still twisted his words **to offend Sherlock. **They used _his own words_ against _his friend. _

How dare they?

How Dare They?

How. Dare. They?

HOW DARE THEY?!

John took three shaky breaths, counting to ten in his head.

1

2

3

4

5

6

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8

9

10

There. Ever since Sherlock had gone he had struggled with his pain, with his anger. He seemed to just go off like a bomb. Hah. Ironic. Trying to control the anger just made it worse, it bubbled up so much that it shot out of him. How do you control a volcano?At least the deep rage pushed the grief to the back of his mind, just for a few brief seconds. Seconds of blissful relief where he could just smash and shout at the world and yet still everything seemed blissfully quiet. Sherlock would have understood what that meant. Why he felt like that. He would have come out with some smart arse comment with a scientific name. Told him he was wrong to care but he didn't care if he was wrong any more. He cared.


End file.
